It must have been quite the gale that blustered through the forests near Elk Creek.

I wish I had seen it happen, as I am fascinated by all manner of meteorological spectacles.

Although probably it’s better for me, and in particular for my skull, that both of us missed this particular show. A windstorm in the woods is an event best viewed from the summit of a rocky peak or the middle of a meadow, but these sorts of treeless safe zones aren’t abundant around Elk Creek.

I first saw evidence of the prodigious gusts a few weeks ago. I was hiking the road that climbs from the Elk Creek ford to Old Auburn Reservoir (which these days rarely qualifies as much more than a snowmelt puddle).

How peculiar this past week has been, bringing such a prolonged patter of rain to the roofs of Baker City.

This is at least a pleasant sound. The soothing rhythm reminds me, when I listen during that peacefully hazy period which precedes sleep, of the trilling of a small stream heard through an open window.

Effective June 1, the Baker City Herald will change our publication dates from five days to three days a week, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Our doors will continue to be open for business five days a week, and we will continue to be a daily news organization, publishing news to the Web every day at www.bakercityherald.com. But we won’t be printing a newspaper on Tuesday or Thursday.

Reducing our publication frequency will not reduce our local news content.

It bothers me that Americans, acting on behalf of my country and therefore on behalf of me, poured water in some people’s faces to try to convince those people that they were drowning.

It bothers me, but I’m not sure it was a mistake.

My ambivalence stems largely from my inability to indulge in the fantasy that waterboarding, or any of the other unpleasant “interrogation techniques” my country has subjected certain people to over the past several years, happened simply because George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are dullards and bullies.